Marriage

The dream wedding. That is my center of focus today. I can’t pretend that I haven’t thought and planned that day millions of times, even though there is no way to be assured that it will come. It is just one of those things that seem so natural, so uniform that there is no way that I can imagine life without marriage. I mean, life without someone to call my own seems extremely lonely. Friends are fantastic and necessary, but they aren’t going to be the ones holding you every night and being there 24/7 for you. Friends won’t be the ones to have children with you or set long term goals with you. Life without that long term partner that will always be there seems impossible. And sad. Which is why people daydream of that day, the wedding day, that will assure them life will be alright from then on.

My dream wedding is big and bright and traditional. Think about the stereotypical wedding and you see my dreams of grandeur. The big white dress with lace and frills that takes a bridesmaid to help you pee in is what I really want. The church with an aisle that seems entirely too long and a piano player that seems older than the church is what I really want. The big reception at a party hotel with big rowdy drunk friends and a DJ with all my favorite songs is what I really want. Of course, no need to talk about budget, as it is unlimited in the dream world.

Purple is the wedding color, a light lavender and dark violet. Not only is this a symbolism thing, it also is just good color taste. The food will be delicious, with yummy dinner rolls and sweet butter for it. Since the bride is always busy, constantly trying to please everyone by putting in the appropriate amount of small talk time to every guest, bread and butter will probably be the only form of sustenance I get until the honeymoon (which will be the standard week long retreat; no skimping out where it counts).  Just daydreaming about this makes me feel like I’m ready to run off and get hitched.

Of course, that would never happen to me at this point in time, since I am so young and have a lot more decisions to make before I get to that point in time. But, until then, I will continue to ogle at cute wedding dresses and plans, because let’s be honest, everyone wants to get married. Even if they are too jaded to realize it yet.

Sincerely Sydney

Harding Middle School

The middle school which my sister goes to had Hazmat come in today. Some kids apparently let some gas or something being released into the air to an extent that had eight kids hospitalized and many more reporting to be very ill. My sister explicitly said she felt “dizzy with a headache and nasty feelings”. Kids were throwing up left and right. The media was reporting it as soon as the firefighter squad was called. However, parents weren’t notified until after 3 o’clock as to assure they can’t call their child out of school. The only precaution the school went through was to not let the kids go onto the first floor unless they were exiting the building. The smell started in the cafeteria and slowly permeated throughout the school. My sister happily reported that the school will not be open tomorrow, so she gets a skip day.

The problem here is that the media got to find out about a potentially lethal situation at a middle school full of children before the parents and guardians. Parents have the right to know about their children’s surroundings and if those surroundings happen to change, they have the right to know that as well. There is always debate about how much the school should be involved in the child’s life choices. Should they get much input and be able to decide whether a child should be in contact with potentially deathly chemicals?  Or should they be required to contact parents the second anything out of the ordinary happens?

This could be very difficult on the schools, which would have to decide where to draw the line on contact with parents over children’s lives. I mean, do you call every time their kid gets a baby headache at school? Maybe not. With sickness though, it should be the parent’s decision on how to deal with the child. The parents are the ones who must take care of the child at home, take of days of work to nurse their offspring back to health. The school only has a control over the child when he should be in school. The parent is the one who gets the child on the weekends and breaks and evenings.

No matter what the final decision is for how much contact the school should have with parents, when kids are being hospitalized, the parent has the right to know first. Harding, you slipped up this time.

Sincerely Sydney

Fear Factor

I don’t think I could do it. Being strapped onto a bungee cord and then put into a human slingshot. Being flinged into a fishermen’s net that is elevated many hundreds of feet above the ground and having to catch onto it. Then unhook the flags that are to the fishermen’s net and bungee jump off of the net once it is all done. All under time. And this is just the first challenge. The next challenge involved some poisonous snakes and after that the challengers eat some cow testicles.

You probably are asking why anyone would volunteer to do these things and more. If the hour of fame on television is not incentive enough, the cash prize of $50,000 generally helps people want to face their fears. Honestly, this game show picks pretty ridiculous people to go on it. The stereotypical cheerleader and her “manly man” boyfriend who is whipped are the typical contestants. The trash talking is to the max and you can’t help but laugh at their triteness. Nevertheless, the show is addicting and currently on my television. You can’t help but be amused by these big displays of insanity.

I can’t help but wonder if all these competitions are actually safe though. For instance, on this episode one partner has to be upside down hanging from their ankles during the entire challenge. It’s been over 5 minutes and she is still dangling there. That can’t be good for a person. At all. Plus, the animal stunts are starting to be questioned by animal rights activists because of what the humans have to do with them. For instance, transferring live snakes by mouth is questionable enough, but these people are biting into snakes. Some things are just so vulgar that even NBC refuses to air them. For instance, the episode that is supposed to be aired on the 30^th of January this year had contestants drinking donkey semen and urine. Understandably NBC decided this was too much, and Fear Factor has to play a rerun for that date. 

Sincerely Sydney

Pre-Medicine-Part-1

If every college says that it is the best, how do you know which one is truly the best? You can look at test scores I suppose, and percentage rates of people who succeed outside of the college. But still, that is a lot of colleges to have to compare over such odd little numbers. Plus, every college seems to have one or another claim to fame to flaunt that it is hard to keep them all in check. Those little qualifying words that they throw at you are enough to make my head spin.
Then there is the whole pre-med thing. Yes I know it is crazy, and when I tell people I want to become a doctor they just look at me and kind of tilt their head to the side like I’m crazy. They ask me stupid questions, like do I know I need to go to school forever to become a surgeon and that it will be really expensive. Why yes, I do know that getting there will be hard. But it is something I want to do. I want to be able to help people. To be able to go to bed at night and be able to say that I saved a life. That isn’t something you can get with just any old job.
More about this next week.
Sincerely Sydney

Blogging as Therapy?

Doctors in Israel sure think so! They have come to the conclusion that blogging allows teenagers to have a sort of diary, and the comments on these posts tended to offer comfort to the girls and boys blogging. The observation, explained in the linked article, shows that blogging helps teenagers get through rough times by venting. I can't say I don't feel like I am of the same opinion. I write about almost everything and anything on this blog. Everything is always "current" in regards that it is currently on my mind in one way or another. I wrote about death when I found out about some great tragedies. I wrote about How I Met Your Mother when I watched it for hours one night. Anything that has me thinking so much that I am having trouble collecting my thoughts about other things goes down in this blog.

 I don't think it would quite be the same, however, if I thought billions of people were reading this. Then it would feel more commercial, less personal. My audience would change and so would the way I write, to fit this new audience. My AP Lang teacher says things like that all the time, and I'm pretty sure that since he is a doctor I should listen to him.

Anyways. I'm just saying that I find it very nice to be able to blog about whatever suits my fancy and know that somebody might read it and feel the same way. And even if no one reads it, I at least get to have my thoughts all put together in a coherent way. It is a way for me to actually have to sit down and focus on some emotion or the other and say, "this is what I think", rather than just have emotions and half thoughts rattle around in my brain for hours. This blogging thing is a good idea, and when I found a study that supported that opinion, I just had to introduce it to you guys.

Sincerely Sydney

The Ugly Truth about Barbie

America's favorite doll, the Barbie, is finally being accused of being more than just a girls’ favorite toy. Barbie has had many jobs in life including doctor, manager, trainer, receptionist, lifeguard, partier, and many more. However, now she is being accused of having another job: promoting anorexia. Take her proportions and blow them up to real people size and you get a woman 5’9” with a 39" bust, 18" waist, and 33" hips. Let’s put this into real people words. Toddlers have an 18 inch waist. With this height and such, Barbie would probably weigh 110 pounds and not get her period because she would be anorexic with a BMI of 16.24. With these proportions, Barbie would have to walk on all fours.

Now let’s be real. The people who created Barbie probably did not go through all this trouble and intend for the doll to be taken this way. They did know though that they were trying to promote a skinny and pretty ideal for women though. How do I know this? Well when Slumber Party Barbie came out, the set came with a scale set permanently to 110 lbs and a book called “How to lose Weight”. The book’s instructions said, simply, don’t eat. Now that sounds real healthy. 

Barbie with real proportions

I’m not trying to say that the Barbie Company is the reason that at a healthy BMI, most girls still feel too fat and ugly. However, it is a great symbol of what our society has come to. The ideal 110 pounds is fought for with many destructive habits like bulimia and anorexia. And unfortunately, no matter what height you are, that seems to be the goal weight. It doesn’t even matter how healthy you are or how you get there.

And then it goes to clothes. Barbie didn’t have every possible outfit imaginable, but she did always have the most stylish options. With everything she did, she had to have 10 new cute outfits to make it possible; she constantly was in a costume. This is how girls are today, always needing to wear what the latest trends say are socially acceptable. Wear sweats for one day and people ask you if you are tired, sick, or having a “crusty”-day which of course you accept and promise to do better tomorrow. Wear skirts that cover or a turtleneck and you are now a prude, or at least unattractive.  Let’s be honest, the clothes that girls are “supposed” to wear are uncomfortable and cold. But Hey! At least they look pretty.

Finally, there is the Barbie half-head doll, where little girls everywhere learn to comb and style hair. Now, while this seems relatively harmless, hair will always be an important thing to girls from then on. The only spot that is allowed to have hair at any time is on top of the head, which Barbie proudly sports, and since it is there it must be well done. Meaning no ponytails or sloppy braids. Almost every girl by the age of 12 has a curling iron, blow dryer, and straightener along with many hair products to put in it for style. Never is natural an acceptable option unless you are one of the lucky few who has naturally perfect hair. So damaged is a girl’s hair that is actually starts to thin out as the hairs are melted together by excessive heat.

I didn’t even touch on makeup, not because Barbie doesn’t wear any, because she does, but because Barbie is so perfect that hers is the same every day and can be done with no time spent. Unfortunately for human girls, it would take about 30 minutes every day to achieve the Barbie look, just makeup wise. This is obviously not an option because the person would be spending too much time starving themselves and exercising. Geez Barbie. How unrealistic.

Sincerely Sydney

Things I don't Understand

If I made a genuine list of things I don't understand, you guys would have thousands of millions things to read and then some. So today I'll try to shorten it all to one word: death. Now I'm not talking about the 100 year old lady who lived a long and happy life and died simultaneously with her husband in his arms. That is just plain fine. Give a three cheers for God and a few speeches about how happy you are to have had known them and everything will be okay. No, what I'm talking about is the tragic car accident of the high school girl getting killed in her graduation cap and gown. Or the teenage boy who loses a child at three months, or the women who gets Alzheimer disease at 40. What I don't understand is how a God that I believe in to be great and all-powerful can allow this to happen to the most innocent of people.
I mean, is it punishment? You have lied so now you are denied to a happy life? You had sex before marriage so now you are denied that child? You have disrespected you parents so now you can never become one? I don't understand; this great God is supposed to be all merciful. Forgive you when you slip up because as a human race we are but imperfect. I can’t help but believe that He does, so how are the great tragedies explained? Are they just a coincidence? Evil winning over good for once, showing that even God can miss some things?  I kind of doubt that honestly. Maybe it is His way of showing us what to be grateful for. I tend to avoid being thankful for my parents when they ask me to stay in on a Friday night to babysit. Should I instead be thanking them for being alive? Probably.
Nonetheless, the amount of tragedy is so great that it is hard to keep in perspective whether it is for the best or not. Everyone says, “I’m sorry for your loss. They are in a better place now though.” It is hard to think that way when it is your loss and not somebody else’s. Yes, heaven is the ultimate destination, where you want to end up, even better than Earth. But still, the person has to look down on us living life: falling in love, achieving success, experiencing a wide-range of emotions. Does your want for life diminish when you reach heaven? That you no longer want these things or miss those you left behind? Or maybe you just have all these wants fulfilled; your own dream world at your finger tips.
The problem is that no one knows what it is going to be like when we die. Everyone has guesses and some say they have been told by God, but there is no scientific proof so I have a hard time truly believing anyone’s ideas. I mean, what if you just die? No more thoughts, no more feelings, no more you? Like one of those dreamless nights, you experience nothing. It is impossible to imagine since you are constantly in some form of cognitive thought process.
Thinking about death just raises more questions for me than answers. This is just one of those things that neither Wikipedia nor Google can help me answer, and I am at a sincere loss. I never know when my last day will be or if something horrid will ever happen to me. I can hope not and try to build up some good karma, but until something decisive happens I will just value what I have at this point and time because I am truly a blessed person.
Sincerely Sydney

A bit about Patenting Genes

That's right. There are patents out there that say you can't even know your own gene sequence. It is like telling someone they can't know if they have blue eyes on a rating of ridiculousness. The genes that are patented show your chance of getting certain heriditary diseases, including the BRCA 1 and 2 genes. These genes tell whether you are more or less likely to get breast or ovarian cancer, and the test to read these gene sequences is only offered to the company who patented it, Myriad Genetics. Unfortunately, this test is over $3000 dollars for a simple blood draw, which then has the blood centrifuged and analyzed, decoding the sequence and searching for mutation. There is no room for competitive pricing or cheaper process design because only this company can run tests on these genes. Another down side is the fact that many insurences are turned down by the company as they will not pay full price for the process. Altogether, this costly examination is not easily available and it should be since it can save lives.

Women that got the test would be able to go through precautions to avoid getting such a killing cancer, by having ovaries or breast removed.

I'm going to write an argumentative essay about this. Just so all of you know.

Piercings and tatoos

Do I want a tattoo? How many piercings do I want? These are the main questions of today for me actually. Legally, I can't get a tattoo for a couple more years anyways, nor do I think I should make an irrational choice at a young age. But I do kind of want one, though I don't know what I would get it of. I see plenty of  butterflies and birds and names of loved ones, and I don't know if I'd necessarily would want to do anything of that sort. I guess tattoos are more to mark significant events for me than to mark things I like. For instance, my mum has a frog tattoo because they are one of her favorite animals. I'm sure there is some significance for her, but I don't think an animal will ever find its way onto my skin.

Piercings on the other hand are changeable. You can have them close up and no longer be there, get them re-pierced, change their appearances, etc. They are only for beauty and showing a facade of oneself, not for representing something that will forever have changed you. Currently I have 5 piercings, all on ears. I know for certain I will never get a facial piercing; they generally are pretty nasty and get infected way too easily. However, I am considering the standard bellybutton or more ear piercings. Thinking about the act of piercing, it is a weird thing and seems like a form of self mutilation. They do look cute though and are almost entirely accepted in our society.

 It is hard to decide what is okay for piercings and tattoos and what goes too far. Once so very taboo, now they are standards in forms of expression. It is mostly shades of gray when deciding where and what to get, so it seems like if you'd be okay with other people knowing what you had done, you probably won't be ashamed of it come tomorrow. Both processes are reversible though, thank goodness. Wrinkles and Jonas Brother's tattoos don't go well together.

Sincerely Sydney

Writing Tattoos: usually okay

Pinterest: A New Craze

One of my best friends spent almost all winter break with me. We were constantly going back and forth from her house and our other friends’ houses. Sometimes we did have a lack of inspiration and resorted to searching the internet for fun things to do, which is when I got introduced to Pinterest. This website is sweeping the nation and it is not hard to see why. Everything (and I do mean pretty much anything) is on this website, with pictures and little captions. The premise is that you look at all these cool things and "pin them" to boards you create on their online world. That way the things you like are organized and at your fingertips with just the click of your profile. You can also follow people and see what they have been liking in addition to finding your own things.
 If you are skeptical like I was, you probably haven't seen the website. At first it is a little overwhelming. There are so many pictures on the front page that you can hardly look at everything, and that front page doesn’t even scrape the top of the many things the site has. My favorite things are the many hairstyles and recipes on their site because if you click on the picture it will take you to the website where it explains how to do them. Since becoming a member (which is free), I have learned a new braid, made Cake Batter Pancakes, and crafted Nutella filled sugar cookies. All three I actually enjoyed quite a lot.
In addition, the signup situation is easier than even a facebook signup.  If any of you guys are like me and have less than standard computer skills, you will find this a positive thing. It also doesn’t require a lot of personal information for all you mothers out there fearing for your child’s safety from sexual predators.  In addition, for all of you people who are waiting for one of those requests from the site itself and not from a friend with the website, just signup using your Facebook account. That way will be much quicker.
However there is a bit of a disclaimer. Watch out for Pinterest addiction. Just like Facebook, there are people out there who are on it constantly, especially since it has an app for data phones and iTouches. The site can suck you in just the same as facebook because you’ve never seen it all, so I’d exercise some caution with time management if you find yourself spending all your free time on the site. Other than that, go nuts with it! And comment on this post if you find more yummy recipes for me to try because I do have a big sweet tooth.
Sincerely Sydney

Brain sides

So today I took a test that was supposed to gauge whether I am left or right side dominant for my brain. I’m currently reading a book called The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat. This book is a bit older, made in the late 20^th Century so the research obviously is not current; however it has many important and interesting stories regarding neurological illnesses. One of the more important facts you gain from this book is that right side controls how you view reality, while the left side is more determinant with a mathematical view. For instance, the man who actually did mistake his wife for a cap had a severe neurological disorder on the right side of the brain, making him mistake reality.

Anyways, this test I took did not determine that, but I thought that was a bit interesting. This test dealt with the more commonly known right side/left side theory; the left side of the brain is for math and science individuals and the right side of the brain is for more artsy individuals. More specifically, people who exhibit dominance in the left side of the brain are supposed to be good at understanding logical problems, very literal, and organized. They generally have trouble with abstract or emotional concepts and non-proven things. In my mind I can’t help but believe these people are smart but cold. On the other hand, the people who think dominantly with the right side of the brain are supposed to be more creative, better at inferring things, and can combine multiple points to find a main idea. Unfortunately, they also tend to lack communication skills because of their bad organizational skills and no attention to detail. 

Brain Sides

The quiz told me that I am overall Left Brain Dominant. I am still a bit unsure if this would be considered good or bad. I mean obviously good for my future career as a pediatric surgeon, but not so good with relationships. I mean, I can see how this quiz is mostly correct. But is it mostly correct because I’m looking for examples to fit the results or because it is genuinely a true theory. That is the hard part, deciphering whether this is an accurate assessment after I already know what I should be looking for.
I highly recommend everyone take this test, just to observe and see the accurateness. I don’t remember where this test was, but I’m sure if you Google it, it will pop up with no problems. It isn’t necessarily a new theory. It is very interesting though.
Sincerely Sydney

New Year, New Year's Resolution

Ball Drop

After a short year, we are ready to start yet another one. Another year of trials and triumphs, of love and loss, of new beginnings and ends. Now that I'm done being a fortune cookie, it is important to note I love New Year's Eve. So full of hope and promise for a better and happier year. But then New Year's Day comes along and you realize that 2011 feels a lot similar to 2012. In fact, you can't even tell the difference. Everything remains the same except now you must try to stick with those pesky New Year's Resolutions. Everyone has one; usually it is to find new love, drop down to a size 00, or get the dream job. Anything that will make the individual feel as if they will have the best year ever.

 Needless to say, I've made my own resolutions. Some a bit unrealistic (to get a beauteous 6-pack) and some more easily achieved (to apply for some colleges). It's about making life changes, but honestly it is more like a bucket list for the year. I have a hard time believing that most resolutions are achieved and generally they are not. For instance, I've had "get six pack" on my resolution list for 3 years. I have yet to reach that goal, but it is still a possibility every year. Generally you cant stay on track for the goal for 3 months. But come Easter and those Chocolate Peanut Butter Eggs are on the market... that is when it all goes downhill.

Not to be a Debby-Downer. I mean of course if i make resolutions I find some value in them. I just need to learn how to stay motivated throughout the course of a year. Maybe the rest of the world's population does a better job than I do.

Sincerely Sydney